Do we have an ecological and/or ethical obligation to restore (at least some) ecological communities that we directly disturbed?

yes
no
I’m not sure how I feel about this

Why?

This is a basic translocation and it is a commonly used approach in biodiversity management.

Translocations can be data-driven to ensure a match between donor and recipient populations

Even within-species translocations or re-introductions can be highly controversial

But what if there aren’t any other living populations of the species we want to restore?

Can we justify translocating close relatives, with similar ecological roles?

But what if a close relative isn’t an option?

All else being equal, should we introduce an ecological analog of that species that isn’t endemic to the community but is surviving in a similar ecosystem elsewhere in the world?

yes
no
I’m not sure how I feel about this

Taxon substitutions: Reintroducing an ecological analog to restore ecosystems, reduce secondary extinctions, and avoid other cascading effects.

But even seemingly similar species are not interchangeable as ecological replacements…

In the extreme, we could be bringing back mammoths or dinosaurs?

All else being equal, should we bring back an extinct species that was recently lost and re-introduce it to its original community?

yes
no
I’m not sure how I feel about this

Death of “Sudan” last male of his subspecies

Two remaining females (his daughter & granddaughter)

“There still might be hope, however, for the northern white rhino. Scientists have saved some of Sudan’s genetic material, and they hope to use in-vitro fertilization to bring the subspecies back. They’ll have to use a southern white rhino as a surrogate, Vitale said, but they like their chances.”

De-extinction: Process of resurrecting a species (or a functional proxy of that species) that has died out. Typically proposed to be accomplished by:

• In-vitro Fertilization : produce embryos in the lab and use a surrogate for gestation

• Selective Breeding : artificial selection on living relative to produce desired traits

• Cloning : grow new individual from genetic material of a single parent (transferred to modified egg cell)

• Genome editing : making targeted changes to the genome of a close relative

“The researchers who brought back the bucardo stated that only two things stand between them and a whole herd of healthy de-extinct bucardo: time and money”

BBC Helen Pilcher: “For the last few years, Church and his team have been carefully placing mammoth genes into the cells of Asian elephants, woolly mammoths’ closest living relatives… Church’s team have made 45 changes to the elephant genome. They are moving closer to their goal of”mammoth-ifying” an elephant cell…

But they may have a long way to go. A 2015 study compared the woolly mammoth genome with that of living Asian elephants, and identified changes in 1,642 genes

Church’s 45 changes amount to a small fraction of that total, but Church argues that he does not need to put every single tweak into his elephant cells to make something mammoth-like.”

Will the result be a mammoth…

These efforts raise interesting and difficult questions about conservation priorities and whether funds are better spent on protecting species that are endangered but not yet extinct.

• Pick one topic and write a reflection or report on an interesting article
  • Should we restore biodiversity through de-extinction?
  • Should we use existing technology to engineer climate resilience in threatened species?

• Make sure and reflect on scientific, social, ethical, economic, regulatory, and science communication questions/issues.
  • Submit your response on Brightspace